#1 Source of Disease

The #1 Source of Disease in the Developed World – Our Thoughts You are probably aware that the #1 cause of poor health (assuming we are not denied the basics for life: food, water, air, etc.) is our thinking.The combination of body, mind, and spirit is the basis of the holistic approach to health. What we think, what we believe about ourselves, other people, and God, matters.

Our health oftenis based on our view of the past, and of our relative outlook on the present and for the future. The signals we send to every cell of our body, as well as the choices we make, come from our perspective on life.

There are many ways that we see the effects of our thoughts: the negative effects of the negative emotions of anger, fear, stress, etc., and the positive effects of the positive emotions, especially love. What is a good visual for showing how our thoughts affect our health? The answer arrived this week.

In my previous employment, my boss asked that my presentations to the staff be in graphs rather than just words or numbers. His point was that when you see a graph plotted over time, the truth is pretty evident. My comments always were much more focused as a result!

“Mortality and Morbidity in the 21st Century,” a paper presented this week (3/23-24/17) by Anne Case and Angus Deaton at the Brookings Papers on Economic Activities Conference, is a good example of the benefit of graphs. Their paper shows a clear rise in the rates of death and disease in white, high school male graduates (WHSM), age 45-54, in the United States from 1990-2015 (graphs at end and in Appendix of their report). This report may seem based on a narrow portion of the population (WHSM) and the less optimistic future for them, but substitute other variables - loss of a spouse or child, severe accident injury, loss of a house or job, etc. Devastating losses or events will produce similar graphs. Just scrolling through all of the graphs at the end of the report and the Appendix takes only a couple of minutes and provides virtually all of the information you need (saving the time of reading a lot of words!). The graphs indicate that WHSM with some college fared better in health and mortality, and those with a BA or higher showed improvements in both health and mortality. Graphs for almost every other demographic in the developed world shows improvements in these specific areas. For WHSM, however, heart disease and cancer saw little reduction compared to other demographics; and WHSM was the only demographic to show increases in chronic lower respiratory disease, and death from drug overdoses, suicide, and alcohol related liver mortality.

The authors’ work shows decreases in health level (increases in self-reported fair or poor health as opposed to good or excellent), and higher pain levels. There also were decreases in socializing and ability to exercise. Blacks and Hispanics, groups that have had financial and other stressors for generations, improved in health and mortality statistics, but the less educated midlife white males, discovering that they will not be better off than their parents, show the effects of their perceptions on their physical well-being. Despair and hopelessness drive self-inflicted harm both in direct action (suicide, and alcohol and drug abuse, e.g.) and indirect action (obesity, diabetes, etc.).

The thoughts that we communicate to our cells influence their ability to function optimally. Our perception of reality greatly affects what our reality will be.

The body develops from a single cell embryo (zygote). In the beginning, the body is a unity. As the body develops, it maintains a unity with diverse specialized parts contributing to the whole. The society of cells function according to certain rules, but they are each influenced by the electrical and chemical messengers both sent and received. From that first moment, the body is a single entity, an interconnected, interdependent ecosystem, and it is ruled by the trinity of the mind (knowledge), heart (will), and gut (instinct). What we have experienced in the past, expect in the future, and observe in the present, all mix to determine what is our best state of being: joy, discouragement, peace, fear, satisfaction, anger, etc.

If our hope is fixed only on things seen, we are left to our own devices. If our hope is based on a belief in a higher good, a higher power, then we are not alone, and this is our hope. It is a great weariness to have no hope beyond our own efforts, particularly when we see that the barn we have filled for our future will fall into the hands of another (Luke 12:13-21).Feelings affect physiology. We feel stress in the tension of our muscles, sudden acidity in our stomach, heart beats quicken, blood pressure rises, breathing becomes more rapid, and so on. Every negative emotion has its own set of effects on the various body systems, signaling to the rest of the body what are the conditions in the outer world. The body obediently responds as it is directed.

The average white man with less education and now in his later working years sees a bleak future. For some of them, self-destructive behaviors result, and health declines. That same future, what the WHSM mourns, would actually look better than their current experience for the majority of men in the world. And they would respond in health, not in self-destruction.

How we perceive life determines our present and our future. As we change our perception, we change our present and our future. Change is the one constant. Adaptation is necessary.

We must have a willingness to not just accept change, but to charge into it, knowing that the obstacles set before us are for our instruction and development. Our livelihood, our ability to contribute to society, to be a part of the whole, depends upon embracing change.​ Even our own health depends upon it.Next article